I’ve recently had the pleasure of visiting the Andrew Gordon Butchery and Fine Foods Store in Chattan Place, Aberdeen. The owner, Andrew Gordon, is also known on Twitter as @aberdeenbutcher, and is a relatively new follow of mine. I was aware of regular tweets over the last couple of months from people who’ve been into his shop and were raving about how great the quality and taste of his produce is, but I hadn’t got round to visiting for myself.
The last time I visited a butcher’s shop was a couple of years ago in Appleby in Westmoreland and that was a completely old style butcher with zero in the way of display in the shop. I had to ask for what I wanted, and it was brought out from massive freezers.
I’m ashamed to say that before visiting Andrew Gordon’s Butcher Shop, my previous impressions of butchers were of smelly, blood reeking establishments that I didn’t plan on hanging around in.
The impression at Chattan Place takes my old-fashioned experiences of butcher shops and knocks them on the head.
The outside of the shop is pleasantly understated, but also welcoming and clean. Walking inside is a completely different experience to my past butcher shop experiences. The shop gives off the lovely aroma of food we would want to eat, and boasts a wealth of lovely accompaniments for meals. The staff were friendly and welcoming, and although slightly embarrassed, let me take some bloggie snapshots.
A huge cheese selection has something for everyone, I suspect. The store also boasts bread, chutneys, sauces, eggs and even tips on cooking. I noticed a row of Earl Grey Tea, which seems to be something that Andrew has taken in as part of an initiative from a local school. I really must find out more about this and show you the photograph of it at my next AG recipe, as the box of tea looked fabulous, and would make a lovely gift for tea connoisseurs.
I can see I will keep saying this, but I was surprised to find bright colours, gorgeous cabinets full of lovely looking cuts of meat, fish, poultry, sauces, and much much more. There were cards with tips on cooking, and lots of items are tagged with the comment “ask how to cook me.”
On the right hand side of the picture below you can see their special offer deal for May 2012. On offer, they have 10 chicken breast fillets/supremes for £25.00. If you live in Aberdeen, or even close enough in Aberdeenshire to come into town, make sure you pop in and see how a butcher shop really should look. Given the size of these fillets, I do think that is a pretty good deal for the freezer.
While I came away with an astounding array of goodies in a fabulous cool box, my first post is simply to show a recipe that I made up to go with the absolutely huge chicken breast supremes that came home with me. I’ll show you some more pictures, and my impressions of the store and produce in my next Andrew Gordon Home Cooking Challenge.
For my lovely meal, six of us ate from the recipe, and I have three strapping lads to feed, as well as a man who likes a good bit of animal protein.
Ingredients
- 800 – 900g chicken breast / fillet.
- 6 heaped tablespoons mango chutney (I buy Premium Mango Chutney in huge jars from Costco).
- Rapeseed oil.
- 1 clove of garlic crushed or chopped, or a teaspoon of garlic from a jar.
- 1/2 tin of coconut milk (mix well in the tin before adding).
- Salad, vegetables and fruit to serve.
- Pitta bread or wraps.
Method
- Cut chicken into pieces.
- Shallow fry the chicken in the minimum of rapeseed oil. Use a large frying pan, wok, or even a thick bottomed saucepan on low – medium heat. Turn the chicken often to make sure it doesn’t burn.
- Add the 6 tablespoons of mango chutney and the garlic.
- Stir often to make sure the chicken and mango chutney don’t burn. Turn down the heat, and let the mixture bubble away for a few minutes.
- Mix in the coconut milk a little bit at a time on a low heat at the end or it will separate.
To serve, simply warm pitta bread or wraps, choose vegetables, salad or fruit, and serve in large dishes for sharing.
Really Yummy recipe I would like to try this at home. Thanks for sharing this information.
Is so easy to do and very quick. I keep standbys like chutneys for chicken when I don’t have lots of time to cook.
Good butchers make the supermarket shelves look inferior don’t they?
It was a pleasant surprise to go and see all the food on offer. I can see I will be back.
The coco mango chicken looks really good. I think I would leave the coconut out and just have it with the mango chutney though.
Would be just as good I think with only mango. Do you have the smoothie recipe we talked about ready?